Daijiworld Media Network - Ankara
Ankara, Feb 18: A Turkish parliamentary commission on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved a report proposing legal reforms alongside the disarmament of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, marking a significant step in a renewed peace process aimed at ending more than four decades of conflict.
The PKK, designated a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, halted its decades-long armed campaign last year and called on Ankara to take steps enabling its members to participate in politics.
The commission’s vote shifts the peace initiative to the legislative arena as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in power for over two decades, seeks to end a conflict that has claimed more than 40,000 lives, fuelled domestic tensions and spilled over into Iraq and Syria.
The roughly 60-page report outlines a roadmap for parliament to enact new laws, including a conditional legal framework under which the judiciary would review legislation and ensure compliance with rulings of the European Court of Human Rights and Turkey’s Constitutional Court.
The report sets out two core objectives — achieving a “terrorism-free Turkey” and strengthening democracy. It was approved by 47 lawmakers on the commission, with two voting against it and one abstaining.
Political parties represented on the panel agreed that reforms and PKK disarmament should proceed reciprocally and in parallel. However, the section dealing with legal reforms links implementation to verified PKK disarmament. It envisages a temporary and separate legal framework, the appointment of a special executive authority to oversee implementation, and continued judicial oversight to avoid perceptions of a blanket amnesty.
The democratisation chapter recommends full compliance with European Court of Human Rights and Constitutional Court rulings, clearer definitions in anti-terror laws to exclude non-violent acts, and expanded freedoms of expression, press and assembly.
The commission was formed in August 2025 to support a potential new phase in efforts to resolve the conflict, which has hampered economic development in Turkey’s predominantly Kurdish southeast.
The PKK launched its insurgency in 1984, initially seeking an independent Kurdish state but later shifting its demands towards greater rights and limited autonomy. The group has been pushed back into mountainous northern Iraq by the Turkish military.
The PKK has indicated it would withdraw from Turkey as a first step toward legal reintegration into society, responding to calls from its jailed leader Abdullah Ocalan.